Readings found here
What do you want to do now?
Imagine if Paul’s words in his letter to the
community in Corinth were the opening address of an annual meeting.
“Knowledge puff us, but love builds up.
Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge,
but anyone who loves God is known by God…”
We may know, but does our knowledge serve to
reconcile?
We may know, but does our knowledge upbuild
the church?
We may know, but does our knowledge give
glory to Christ?
Paul is adamant in his annual meeting
address, I mean his letter to the Corinthians…if what we claim to know destroys
others, then that knowledge is not of God.
Care for each other taking precedence over
any knowledge we might claim.
Imagine. Imagine if this is how we lived.
If we were able to set aside our own desires
whenever those desires would harm others.
In this way, liberty and self-discipline become
partners in our ministry of reconciliation.
Ministry.
We are here for ministry. Not to be
ministered to, altho’ that will happen in a community of ministers, but to be
ministers.
Ministers by virtue of our baptism.
And, so when we gather for our parish Annual
Meeting, we gather as ministers—ministers using the tool of polity and policy
to advance God’s will.
At the beginning of our annual meeting, I
offered/will offer a prayer that petitions God for guidance and reminds us of
the reason that gives purpose to our gathering,
Eternal God, you called us to be your beloved
people, to preach the gospel and show mercy. Keep your Spirit with us as we
meet together, so that in everything we may do your will. Guide us lest we
stumble or be misguided by our own desires. May all we do be done for the
reconciling of the world, for the upbuilding of the church, and for the greater
glory of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
We are beloved people.
And, out of our belovedness we are called to
service, to discipleship. Living out the
good news of the Gospel, showing mercy, and acting only insofar as our actions
are done,
For the reconciling of the world.
For the upbuilding of the church.
And, for the greater glory of Jesus.
For me, this prayer resonates with the Gospel
we heard today.
Chronologically this Gospel follows Jesus’
baptism and his subsequent 40 days in the desert, and his proclamation that the
“kingdom of God is at hand”.
Spiritually, it is a sequence in which Jesus’
identity is made known by God who calls him “my son, my beloved”; then, because
Jesus knows who he is and to whom he belongs, the manifestation of evil which
he encounters in the desert does not have power over him.
Out of this, two truths of Jesus’ nature are
revealed to us:
Jesus is the beloved child of God.
Jesus knows what evil looks like.
And, because Jesus knows what evil looks
like, he can see it in the world. And, because he can see it, he can command
it,
“Be silent and come out of him”.
Jesus’ claim to authority is grounded in his
fundamental identity. His action emerges from his authority, his authority is
grounded in belovedness.
Authority and love—discipline and liberation.
Leading to reconciliation--wholeness for a
man in need of healing.
Our identity too is grounded in
belovedness.
Just as Jesus was claimed as beloved at his
baptism, so too are we. Beloved children of God, “marked as Christ’s own
forever…”
What does this mean, this marking?
It means that,
You do not belong to the world.
You do not belong to the powers of this
world.
You are not an object to be used, you are a
person to be loved.
And, as Christ’s, you are part of something
that cannot be destroyed, can never be destroyed.
This is who you are. This is who we are.
Marked as Christ’s own forever.
Last week, I spoke these very words—claiming
baby Adrian for Christ. The rest of Adrian’s life will be lived in the
aftermath of baptism. And, he will join the rest of the body of Christ living
in the ordinary time.
Ordinary time…
After the promises have been made. After the
community has consented.
This is ordinary time.
33-34 Sundays of the church year are Sundays
we call ordinary. They are defined only in relation to what has come before,
After the Pentecost.
After the Epiphany.
All Ordinary.
Poet Marie Howe offers to us the following
depiction of Ordinary Time, as time when,
The rules, once
again, applied
One loaf = one
loaf. One fish = one fish.
The so-called
kings were dead. And the woman who had been healed grew tired of telling her
story, and sometimes asked her daughter to tell it.
People generally
worshipped where their parents had worshipped—
the men who’d
hijacked the airplane prayed where the dead pilots had been sitting,
and the
passengers prayed from their seats
—so many songs went
up and out into the thinning air . . .
People,
listening and watching, nodded and wept, and, leaving the theater,
one turned to
the other and said, What do you want to do now?
And the other
one said, I don’t know. What do you want
to do?
It was the
Coming of Ordinary Time. First Sunday,
second Sunday.
And then (for
who knows how long) it was here.
It is here, Ordinary Time, the time in which we
are given the opportunity to live in response to what we have seen in the
extra-ordinary times.
Ordinary time is active, not passive. It is a
time when we, as Christians, demonstrate that what we have seen, what we have
heard, and what we have said and promised--that it matters. It matters to us,
it matters to the world. Because,
In ordinary time, we renounce evil.
In ordinary time, we encounter prophets.
In ordinary time, we find healing.
In ordinary time, we have our annual meeting…
I jest, but only just. Because the structures
and statutes by which we govern ourselves don’t exist for us, but for the reconciling of the world, for the up-building of the
church, and for the greater glory of Jesus Christ our Lord.
And so, as we consider our meeting, I ask us
all,
What do you want
to do now?
What do you want to do now?
In this ordinary time--for the reconciling of
the world, for the upbuilding of the church, and for the greater glory of Jesus
Christ our Lord.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment